During the past year, there were two major developments on the domestic and media landscape. The first, which started before 2017 but picked up steam during the past year, was that normal regressive media, already a conduit for conspiracy theories, became increasingly open to amplifying misinformation from the far-right. The second was that Donald Trump was inaugurated as boss — a man who would embrace swindling theories to an border that no high-ranking open official, much reduction the president, had ever done. When combined, these developments led to some swindling theories, which started off in distant corners of the internet, reaching members of the House of Representatives and the White House — infrequently within a matter of days. Here are a few examples.

Obama is handling a “shadow government” in Washington, D.C.

In 2016, then-President Barack Obama leased a home in Washington, D.C. for his family to pierce into after he left business so his daughter Sasha could finish high school. After the election, Ed Klein, a discredited author known for peddling intensely indeterminate claims about domestic figures, claimed on Fox Friendsthat Obama and his aides were actually using that new home for “setting up what they’re job a shade government,” which is “almost an insurgency,” to conflict Trump once he became president. The explain remained generally asleep until Feb 2017, when Paul Sperry, a New York Post columnist who was formerly the Washington business chief for far-right swindling speculation opening WorldNetDaily, published a column claiming that Obama had “an army of agitators” against Trump whom he would authority “from a fort reduction than two miles from the White House,” adding it would “effectively be a shade government.” The swindling theory spread among far-right and feign news outlets before reaching more normal worried media. Fake news websites serve stretched on the swindling speculation after in the year, suggesting “shadow president” Obama was violating the Logan Act, a law exclusive private adults from interfering with American unfamiliar policy.

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In March, Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA), speaking at a city gymnasium in his district, said Obama was using his D.C. home “for one purpose and one purpose only, and that is to run a shade supervision that is gonna totally dissapoint the new agenda.” A orator for Kelly later walked back the conspiratorial remark.

In September, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) told the San Francisco Chronicle that a “former ‘Hillary and Bernie supporter’” hoodwinked “dumb Civil War re-enactors” into attending the rally, adding, “It was left-wingers who were utilizing them in sequence to have this confrontation” and to “put the boss on the spot.” The following month, Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) told Vice News that Kessler “was an Obama sympathizer” and that the convene “was combined by the Left.”

Roy Moore’s accusers were bribed and one of them feign Moore’s signature

On Nov 9, The Washington Post reported that multiple women alleged that then-Alabama Republican Senate claimant Roy Moore intent in passionate bungle with them when they were teenagers, including one who was 14 years old at the time. Shortly after the Post’s report was published, Twitter comment @umpire43 claimed that a “family friend” told the account’s wife that “a WAPO contributor named Beth offering her 1000$ to credit Roy Moore.” Far-right and feign news outlets ran with the tweet, even yet that comment had formerly done a similar allegation about two other news outlets and had lied about its own background. Rep. Billy Long (R-MO) subsequently retweeted a Nov 10 twitter by “alt-right”-connected figure Mike Tokes that pushed the swindling theory.

After the Post’s report, other women accused Moore of passionate assault, including Beverly Young Nelson, who also pronounced Moore had signed her yearbook. In response, far-right outlet The Gateway Pundit cited discredited figure Thomas Wictor to explain the signature was forged. Shortly afterward, Moore’s campaign also suggestedthat the signature was forged. Two weeks later, Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) said in a radio talk that “the justification is almost flawless about either the annual was forged.” Trump, who endorsed Moore in December, also reportedly told people he believed the signature was likely forged. (During a Dec 8 interview with ABC’s Good Morning America, Nelson explained that she had combined a note to Moore’s annual inscription, which led the swindling theorists to falsely claim she had certified to forging the whole document. News outlets were discerning to indicate out that Moore’s scratch in the annual inscription matched another scratch sample produced by “yet another lady who [said] Moore followed her when she was in high school.)

A former Obama central reliable that Obama wiretapped Trump Tower

On Mar 2, nationally syndicated radio horde Mark Levin outlined on his show what he claimed was an Obama administration bid to criticise Trump’s candidacy during the 2016 election by, among other things, wiretapping Trump Tower. The next day, Breitbart published an article that minute Levin’s claims as if they were breaking news. The next day, on Mar 4, Trump accused Obama of illegally wiretapping Trump Tower, tweeting, “This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!” Right-wing and far-right media outlets tried to defend the president’s baseless claim, making up feign and dubious defenses for it.

On Mar 28, a YouTube comment called The Leaping Frog posted a video that it falsely claimed showed former Obama administration central Evelyn Farkas revelation that Obama spied on Trump. Far-right outlets subsequently picked up the video and the explain was eventually aired on Fox News, including on Trump’s favorite morning news show Fox Friends, all within a camber of a few days. Shortly afterward, then-White House press secretary Sean Spicer cited Farkas’ interview to urge Trump’s feign claim.

Truck drivers in Puerto Rico were on a strike during service efforts after Hurricane Maria

In September, Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico and caused widespread damage, leaving hundreds of thousands without electricity, food or water. The Trump administration’s response to Puerto Rico’s predicament drew significant criticism and the island is still struggling to recover from the storm. After San Juan mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz criticized the behaving secretary of homeland confidence for job the administration’s unsound hurricane response a “good news story,” Trump pounded her on Twitter for her “poor leadership.”

On Sep 28, a YouTube comment called visionrealtyusa com posted a video that it secretly claimed showed a Puerto Rican lorry kinship personality earnest to harm the service efforts. Others started pity the video on social media, and far-right and feign news outlets cited the video and other Twitter users to explain Puerto Rican lorry drivers were on strike. A Fox News anchor subsequently pushed the feign claim on Sep 30, and a few days after the Teamsters kinship was forced to debunk the claim. Despite that, on Oct 3, Trump seemed to pull the claim, saying, “We need their lorry drivers. Their drivers have to start pushing trucks. We have to do that. So at a internal turn they have to give us some-more help.”

Alex Kane is former World editor at AlterNet. His work has seemed in Mondoweiss, Salon, VICE, the Los Angeles Review of Books and more. Follow him on Twitter @alexbkane.